Archives for January, 2010

tags: birdday, birthday So I have eaten some chocolate-glazed marzipan cake, a few slices of home-made sourdough-rye bread (hot out of the oven, squeeee!) and now I am drinking some hot Glühwein while watching HP4 (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), and thinking about how magical the past few months have been for me.

tags: Birdbooker Report, bird books, animal books, natural history books, ecology books “How does one distinguish a truly civilized nation from an aggregation of barbarians? That is easy. A civilized country produces much good bird literature.” –Edgar Kincaid The Birdbooker Report is a special weekly report of a wide variety of science, nature and behavior…

tags: christianity, religion, cults, mind control, social phenomenon, Harry Potter, witchcraft, beliefs, education, streaming video This video is a report on the christian wingnuts’ response to Harry Potter — it seems this is another cult of mind-control that is unable to distinguish between reality and fantasy. Since today is my birthday, and I am a…

tags: Mormonism, religion, cults, mind control, social phenomenon, moron, offbeat, beliefs, Proposition 8, education, streaming video As a group, mormons are some of the passive-aggressive people I know. They are nice to everyone, but they are vicious and intolerant behind your back. This film trailer is one example of the double-face I’ve seen and experienced…

Since I live in Germany, all the stores, shops and pubs are closed today (Sunday), meaning I cannot go out to relieve my birthday depression by spending the day in a state of giggly inebriation with my NYC drinking pals.

Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux). Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power) — Sir Francis Bacon. Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is almost here once more and it is still seeking submissions for tomorrow’s edition of this blog carnival! Can you help by sending URLs for well-written blog essays…

tags: Suomenlinnan Muuri, Helsinki, Finland, nature, image of the day Suomenlinnan Muuri (Suomenlinna wall). Soumenlinna, Helsinki, Finland. Image: GrrlScientist, 19 July 2009 [larger view]. This image makes me wonder about the bricks that were (obviously!) added much later to this lovely rock wall: why were they added? Who added them and why? What did those…